


The Lightning

by potentiality_26



Category: Thorne (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, First Kiss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-20
Updated: 2017-10-20
Packaged: 2019-01-19 22:23:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12419487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/potentiality_26/pseuds/potentiality_26
Summary: Ever since the case that brought it all crashing down on them, Tom had started to think he maybe understood what Phil liked so much about it, getting tattooed.  The pain was... just pain, wasn’t it?  Tom had been hurting about as much as he thought it was possible to hurt ever since he looked at Phil that day, finally properly listened to what he was saying, and realized he got it so badly wrong.  He thought it might actually be nice to have that pain drawn up to the surface for once, to let it spark across his skin instead of continuing to burn through the insides of him.So he’d get one, if Phil suggested it a second time, but as Phil’s scalpel-sharp glare softened Tom knew that he wouldn’t.Tom and Phil- and prodding each other until something gives.





	The Lightning

**Author's Note:**

> I had to get this out of my system right after I saw _Sleepyhead_ , but it's post-series compliant even so. 
> 
> Not Brit-picked.

Phil had said three times that he didn’t feel like going.  Tom supposed that if he’d listened any of those times, matters wouldn't have come to a head as they did.  Tom supposed that a lot of things would have been different if he’d been better at listening in general.  Because the thing about him and Phil was-

The thing about him and Phil was that they hadn’t been all right, really, in a long time.  The lack of all right-ness was just... more in the open now.  Mostly Tom wished that they could shove it back into whatever dark corner it had been living in all this while and get back to the normal he was used to.  But every once in a while, in a moment of clarity, Tom thought that maybe there could be some good in all this.  That maybe now he knew something was broken he had a shot at fixing it. 

Unfortunately Phil didn’t seem to want to play.

And it was like a game sometimes, and the game went a little like this: he tried to convince Phil to go with him to some bar or club like they would have before, Phil turned him down, Tom tried again and when Phil turned him down that second time there was usually some chink in the armor that he could pry open and get Phil to join him after all.  It was never exactly fun, this game, but it was something.  Something that would hopefully keep Phil close long enough for Tom to figure this whole thing out.  He was the fucking brilliant detective, wasn’t he?  He _could_ figure it out, couldn’t he?       

Because Phil certainly didn’t seem interested in helping.  Or... what if he did?  He could have shut Tom out completely this time- all the times- but he hadn’t.  What if he _was_ willing to let him try?

Or what if he was just playing game of his own?  Cat and mouse, maybe- fiddling around with Tom for a while before he made the killing stroke.  Or maybe chicken was closer to what it was.  That was Phil’s kind of game, to let something awful bear down on him or Tom or both of them just to see who flinched first.  But flinched from what exactly?  Tom wasn’t sure he knew.  Losing their friendship?  Or keeping it together with the meagerest of bindings even though the evidence suggested that they weren’t good for each other anymore, hadn’t been good for each other in a long time?  Tom had never been less sure about the answers to those questions than he was tonight. 

This place was quieter than Phil’s usual taste, which probably signified... something.  The music was tinny, even distant, in Tom's ears- and Phil was close but not too close beside him.  And Phil never leaned in to talk to him, because he didn't have to.  Lately, whenever he chose where they went, it was somewhere he didn't have to- but it had been different once, hadn't it?Sometimes it was hard to remember how things had once been.      

“This is getting boring,” Phil said suddenly, polishing off his beer and springing into motion.

Tom had an inkling that Phil didn’t just mean their little corner of the club, and that stung more than it had any right to.  Not because thinking that what Phil was tired of- because he always fucking tired these days, wasn’t he?- was _them_ shouldn’t hurt- of course it should, no one could watch a friendship of more than fifteen years crumble without a pang- but because after everything that had happened, after the punches and cruel words thrown around between them, this was such a little thing it should hardly register.  Only it did.  It registered.  “You could get another tattoo,” he suggested.  “That’s not so boring.” 

“I think it might be,” Phil said.  “Unless you’re getting one too.”

Phil had been suggesting that for years, but there was a threatening undercurrent to the way he did it now.  Playing chicken.  It was only Tom’s pestering that got him out like this, but once they _were_ out Phil always had to be... difficult.  He always had to push here and there- with little things, usually.  Places he knew Tom didn’t like going, cuisines he knew Tom didn’t like eating.  Tom was beginning to see that Phil was waiting for him to finally say no- but what Phil intended to do once he did... that Tom didn’t know.  Two possibilities struck him, and Tom hadn't yet decided which it was most likely to be. 

One.  When Tom said no, Phil would be pleased.  He was still angry, angry enough to take some pleasure in watching Tom bend over backwards to keep him in his life, but he did actually want things to eventually get back to some semblance of normal as much as Tom did, and that would be the first sign that they actually could.

Two.  When Tom said no, Phil would not be at all pleased.  The thing that Phil’s game of chicken was building up to might not be normalcy at all, it might be something very different.  Tom supposed many friendships- many relationships, come to that- had it.  That something one of them had over the other, the something that meant _you owe me_ _until we agree you’ve done your time_.  And _you actually thought I could kill all those girls_ \- well.  That was a thing Phil could hold over Tom’s head for the rest of their lives if he liked.  Because he was more than just angry about it, wasn't he?  Phil had always been angry.  Phil had been angry since he met James Calvert, though Tom hadn’t known about that until recently.  Phil had been angry even before that.  Tom hadn’t known it was something he had until it happened, a friend who would cover up a _murder_ for him- and the moment it did happen, he lost it.  Something inside Phil broke that day, and that something had been broken ever since.  The anger lived inside him like a storm beneath his skin, and now it was trying to tear its way out of the fractures.  And Tom thought that if this was the way it manifested, if this was the way Phil had to lash out to make what was inside him something he could live with again, then he could handle it.  He had to at least try. 

But Tom didn’t know which it was, and so he wasn’t ready to risk it.  Not yet.  Instead he shrugged and said, “Why not?”

Phil... stopped.  He went still, the look on his face as sharp was one of his scalpels- ready to cut and slice around until he figured out just what he was looking at.  It was unsettling, but it also gave Tom hope that he hadn’t lost his best friend after all.  If this was a Phil who wouldn’t push Tom into something he knew he didn’t actually want to do, then it was a Phil he could get through to someday. 

Whatever Phil Tom was dealing with, though, he would be wrong about how little Tom wanted to do this.  Ever since the case that brought it all crashing down on them, Tom had started to think he maybe understood what Phil liked so much about it, getting tattooed. The pain was... just pain, wasn’t it? Tom had been hurting about as much as he thought it was possible to hurt ever since he looked at Phil that day, finally properly listened to what he was saying, and realized he got it so badly wrong.  He thought it might actually be nice to have that pain drawn up to the surface for once, to let it spark across his skin instead of continuing to burn through the insides of him.

So he’d get one, if Phil suggested it a second time, but as Phil’s scalpel-sharp glare softened Tom knew that he wouldn’t.

“Don’t think I want to, anyway,” he said with deceptive ease.  As suddenly as he had animated, he went still, pressing his back against the wall and just leaning there, watching Tom with heavy eyes.

Tom might have managed to get Phil to play nice where the job was concerned since their falling out, but privately this was the first time Phil had backed down since Tom... did what he did.  It meant something- Tom just wasn’t sure what.  Tom joined him against the wall, and the moment he did he became intensely aware of Phil's proximity, his heat, the always slightly-antiseptic smell of him.  He was close enough that his shoulder dug into Tom's forearm, and when he turned his head Tom could smell his breath too.  His eyes, always such a _dark_ blue, glittered in the strobing light.  “Then what _do_ you want?” Tom heard himself ask.   

"What do I want," Phil murmured.  He pressed closer still.  This wasn't the sort of place where two men so near to each other was an unusual sight- but it was instinct, all the same, to look around and see if anyone _was_ watching them.  Tom fought the instinct.  He didn’t let himself look anywhere but at Phil.

Who exhaled sharply and kissed him. 

Phil’s lips were faintly chapped, but still soft, and the moment they were on Tom’s they filled his senses utterly.  He could feel it when Phil shook slightly, feel it when Phil ceased pressing forward altogether and went still.  Tom knew that he was still too- and too still to be taken as receptive.  Phil made a noise against his lips and almost- almost pulled back.  Tom decided not to let him.  He lifted a hand and cupped the side of Phil’s face, an earring cool against his fingertips, and kept him right where he was until those lips slackened and went softer still under his. 

Kissing Phil was nice, Tom decided.  A little too clumsy, a little too shy, a little too unfamiliar for fireworks, but nice all the same.  And nice was enough- nice was more than enough- if there was even the smallest chance that some part of Phil’s anger had come from wanting this.  From wanting this and thinking that of all the things between them it was beyond Tom.  It wasn’t beyond him.  In fact- 

In fact, when Tom thought about the other possibility- that Phil didn’t actually want this at all and was just playing chicken again, trying to get Tom to push him away, to refuse him- he felt cold.  He didn’t want this to be a game.  He wanted-

Phil’s lips parted and Tom wanted more of the heat of his mouth, the taste of it, so he let his tongue flicker inside.

Phil jerked back as though he’d been shocked.   

Tom strained to read Phil's face, so close to his despite the withdrawal.  Phil's mouth twisted into a hollow smile and he said, “The penance kick is getting old, now.”  Tom wondered if that meant the kiss had been part of Phil’s little game after all.  That he’d won, for a given value of it, though he didn’t feel like a winner.  The cold spread through him, horribly, and he wanted look away but he didn't.  And he saw that Phil’s smile looked broken, like someone had shorn it in two, and his eyes were as open as Tom had seen them in... he didn’t know how long. 

“That’s not what this is,” Tom said. 

And Phil looked wary of him in a way Tom didn’t think he had _ever_ seen before.  “No?” he asked.

Tom realized that he had been wrong before.  This- _this_ was Phil not pushing him into something he didn’t want to do.  He did still care, if Tom had doubted it.  He did still think their friendship- such as it was- was precious enough not to threaten by letting Tom give him this out of guilt. And he truly, deeply, believed that it could never be out of anything else.  “It’s a little bit that,” Tom admitted finally.  Phil tried to pull away further, but Tom was still touching his face, so he let his fingers work into Phil’s curls and hung on, not letting him get away like he had been letting him get away since he left the skeleton of the Calvert house and never properly come back. 

Judging from the way Phil’s eyes darkened, he liked how that felt- perhaps in spite of himself.  Which- _Christ, Phil._   If Tom had known-

It could be argued that Tom should have known, but... he hadn’t.  He was arrogant in his way, to be sure, but he had never known Phil to do much in the way of longing, never thought of him as the type to wait around for a man he didn't expect to want him back.  But of course, that was because when it came to romance he had only seen one side of Phil- the side that went clubbing most nights of their youth and rarely went home alone, that shrugged his shoulders and moved on when one night stands never became anything more, when other men came and went and only Tom was constant.  It really hadn’t occurred to him that that could mean more than it seemed.  And now... “I am so, so sorry about what happened.  About what I-”

“What you thought,” Phil finished quietly.

Because that was the heart of it, for Phil- how Tom had actually believed that Phil was capable of killing all those women.  That there was something that wrong with him. 

That was what it was so hard to atone for.  Tom didn’t even know where to begin- and that was how they ended up here, in this corner of this club, close enough to share breath but miles apart in every sense that mattered.

But maybe there was something, if he only knew how to say it, how to-

And maybe _Phil_ knew, because he didn’t try to pull away again, and he asked the question Tom realized a part of him had been waiting for all this while: “Do you remember what you kept saying that day?"

"I remember every word."

Phil's mouth twisted again.  "You said _just tell me_.  You kept..."  He cut himself off, choking.  "What were you going to do if I did tell you?  If I said I did it?"

Tom closed his eyes.  A lot of things were on his tongue, clamoring and stinging to be said, and most of them Phil would probably like better than the truth- but they were as close as they had been in a long time, and as close as they would probably ever be again unless Tom could get through to Phil right now.  So- “I was going to try to help you.”

“In the prison way?” Phil quipped, an utter lack of humor in the eyes.  “Come on.  I know how coppers talk to get a confession.”

“No,” Tom said.  “Not in the prison way.”

Phil’s gaze _burned_.  “What happened with Calvert was _wrong_.  It destroyed way more lives than it saved.  But there was nothing about that man that was innocent.”  What Phil didn’t have to say was that Alison Willets, who was so damn brave, and all the others- they were innocent.  And James Calvert might have been as much a victim as anyone in the end, but to say that he hadn’t also deserved every bit of the punishment coming to him wouldn’t be right either.  And so then would Phil, if he had been the man Tom thought he was for a few terrible hours. 

There was only so much Phil could justify covering up what Tom did like he had- it was why it had torn him up so badly over the years- but in this distinction he was hardly wrong.  If he had said _I did it_ , if Tom had actually twisted it all the ways that were running through his head to try to make it not so bad, to try to _fix_ it, it would have been decidedly different.  And if that was all Tom had left to give Phil by way of penance, then give it he would.  “I _am_ sorry,” he said again.  “But if it helps, anything I thought you might be capable of, it wasn't enough to make me-"

Phil kissed him again, hard enough that it was little like getting punched in the mouth all over again. 

Tom met him fiercely, and he thought that maybe he had been wrong before.  Maybe there were a couple of fireworks.

“This is a fucking disaster,” Phil said, but he didn’t stop kissing Tom.  “If you’re trying to convince me that you’re in this for the right reasons, you’re doing a shite job.”  He still hadn’t stopped kissing Tom.  “You don’t even like-”

Tom took control of the kiss, not letting Phil break away for long enough to say anything else until he was breathless, until he made this gorgeous whimpering noise when Tom nicked his lower lip with his teeth.  “Let me decide what I like, yeah?”  Tom hardly recognized his own voice, it came out so gravelly.  Phil was the only person Tom had ever known who could take everything Tom threw at him.  He wasn’t letting go of him, not for anything and sure as hell not for this.  And maybe he didn't completely know what he was doing, but there was no way figuring it out would be the hardest thing they'd ever done, or the worst storm they'd ever weathered.    

“Yeah,” Phil said finally.  He was shaking a little again- his hands coming up to Tom’s jacket lapels and squeezing.

“We could go home,” Tom said.  His, Phil’s, it didn’t matter.  “If you’re tired.”

“I’m not tired,” Phil said.  For a moment, Tom wondered if Phil was playing with him still, or if Phil thought Tom was playing with him.  But then Phil’s lips quirked up into a smile, a smile reflected back in his eyes for the first time in forever. 

“Then maybe I _will_ get that tattoo,” Tom said. 

Phil just shook his head.  “Disaster,” he muttered again.  But he didn’t argue with Tom about... anything, either.  And the quiet between them... it wasn’t back to normal.  Things, Tom understood, would not be going back to the old normal, probably not ever again.  But that was fine.  Louder, Phil added, “A psychologist would have a field day with us.”

“That’s fine too,” Tom said, leaning his head back against the wall and closing his eyes.  He could _feel_ Phil shooting him an odd look, and he knew that was because Phil didn’t know what was going on in his head just then.  One day he would, though.  One day everything would be sufficiently hashed out between them, and all of this- while probably one thing that would never be completely all right- would be in the past.  “Kiss me again, yeah?”

Phil made a soft noise- surprised that Tom said it aloud like that, maybe, or asked at all- and did so, no hesitation, no waiting for one of them to flinch.  And Tom could still sense the storm between them, still taste it metallic on Phil’s tongue, but he didn't mind it.  Not at all. 

**Author's Note:**

> Come see me on [tumblr](http://potentiality-26.tumblr.com/).


End file.
